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CHDK AstroKam
What it does I have now updated CHDK AstroKam and loaded a help file on my site. I have left this page below for reference. ------------------------------------------- AstroKam is a Windows application that lets you control your CHDK camera via USB remote control. It is designed to take long exposures of the night sky. It has LiveView and copies of your camera buttons which allows you to set all the camera parameters remotely as well as RAW shooting. It also allows you to set multi-second duration exposures for deep sky work with the following options: #Single exposure. #Sequence of exposures for stacking. #Sky survey plans of different targets using ASCOM controlled telescope mounts. #Automatic dark and bias frames. #Flat and dark flat frames routine. #Automatic generation of Deep Sky Stacker project files. #Sort module for removing duff images prior to stacking. Installation You must have the following 3 packages installed on your PC before you run AstroKam: #ASCOM platform. #Microsoft .NET framework 4 or later (client). #LibUSB driver for Windows. You then download the AstroKam package, unzip it and run the file called CHDK_AstroKam.exe. Note that you can run AstroKam without a real telescope by selecting the virtual telescope for .NET under the Scope button. Category:PTP Extension Quick Start Guide #Turn on your camera and run AstroKam. #Click the OSD button to see the OSD. The mousewheel zooms the LiveView window. #Click the Record button to put your camera in shooting mode. #The default exposure is 16s as shown at bottom left. Adjust this using the Tv+ and Tv- buttons. #Click the scope button and connect to your ASCOM telescope. Use the scope desktop hand control to point to your first target. #Click Shoot to take a long exposure shot. The title bar will show "Taking shot". #The title bar will show "Ready for next shot" when the shot is finished. #The rest of the buttons have detailed tool tips which show how to use the other features. Useful Software AstroKam is designed to work with other astro software in this workflow: #Plan capture session with Cartes du Ciel (free).AstroKam can import target coordinates from CdC. #Manual or automatic capture with AstroKam. AstroKam automatically generates Deep Sky Stacker files. #Stack catured images in Deep Sky Stacker (free) to produce a FITS file. #Process FITS files in Star Tools (free evaluation) to enhance colors and faint features and remove sky glow. Credits AstroKam is a wrapper around the excellent CHDKPTPRemote.NET by mweerden and chakphanu's LiveView branch of it. Many thanks to them for permission to use their code in AstroKam. Examples #Starry Dave's AstroKam gallery. #Link to > Static time-lapse animation of pre-dawn stars. # Slideshow : Screenshot 20131012@224719.png|Wide angle aiming shot screenshot 20131012@225557.png|Single image of Pleiades star cluster. m45 ivo.jpg|Stacked and processed Pleiades by Ivo of Star Tools m31 ivo.jpg|Stacked and processed Andromeda Galaxy by Ivo of Star Tools Sunspots.jpg|Sunspot groups screenshot 20131015@195930.png|LiveView with OSD screenshot 20131015@200037.png|Full moon preview shot screenshot 20131015@200223.png|Moon detail preview Category:PTP Extension Revision History 01 First public release. 02 Automatic dark and bias frames, flat and dark flat frames routine, sky survey plans, recticle, Deep Sky Stacker project file generation, invert LiveView, settings window. 03 Sort module to remove duff images prior to stacking. Button to save captured images as image sequence to create movies. 04 Ability to edit capture plans added. 09 Support for PHD2 autoguiding and general improvements. Help and Support Please use this thread on the forum to ask for help and advice or discuss AstroKam. Category:PTP Extension